Now that summer is coming up I am going to get busy again. I have two goals for the project this summer. Get Tag's data into the project and add color support.

Next winter I plan on redoing the website as a whole. I haven't decided exactly how I am going to do that. Right now I am leaning towards an HTML 5 remake. Internet Explorer fans won't be happy then.

There are two parts of the website that need the most attention right now. The submission wizard is old and archaic. It could use an ajax overhaul, make it more graphical and dynamic. The reports page could all be combined into a single HTML 5 page. It would just be a list of games with filters to produce the same set of pages. I am imagining something like MAWS. A filter along the left side. The right side will have two panes. The top pane will be a graphics representation of the game that is selected from the list of games int he bottom pane.

Mind you I like chrome, but I can count the number of windows users I know that use chrome on my one finger (me and only occasionally).

It's your baby and all, but it seems like a bad move to finally update the page only to make it inaccessable to the majority of users. Then again I don't think flash is a good choice either. Doesn't work on mobile devices and has similar compatability issues.

Well, they all support html5 to some degree. Safari and Chrome support it because those are the popular mobile browsers and HTML5 is better than Flash for the mobile environment.

Chrome is actually very popular. The fast rise in Chrome is why IE is no longer the top browser in Europe. I saw a chart of browser usage for the last 6 months in Europe. The Firefox line didn't move - level all 6 months. Chrome went up dramatically taking away from IE. As a result making Firefox the most popular browser right now.

And of course Safari is Mac - even though there is a PC port. I like Safari. I use Safari on my Mac, Chrome on the Windows side of the Mac, and Firefox at work. Out of all of them I like Safari the best. However, I tried the PC port of Safari and it blows - go figure.

Looking at what one could do with HTML5 I could totally see an IE9 frontend - put IE9 into full screen mode and use HTML5 along with controls.dat data I think you could make a pretty cool FE.

Well, maybe not an FE because that require running a local exe which web tech frowns on. BUT I see we could make an html5 control viewer. Someone could then just embed IE9 into their FE. The only issue with that is how much traffic would that push to arcadecontrols.com. I would host the FE viewer on my own website possibly. I might just do that at some point.

Looking at what one could do with HTML5 I could totally see an IE9 frontend - put IE9 into full screen mode and use HTML5 along with controls.dat data I think you could make a pretty cool FE.

Well, maybe not an FE because that require running a local exe which web tech frowns on. BUT I see we could make an html5 control viewer. Someone could then just embed IE9 into their FE. The only issue with that is how much traffic would that push to arcadecontrols.com. I would host the FE viewer on my own website possibly. I might just do that at some point.

Well the actual code could be stored locally... the viewer would only need to access the database. As far as that's concerned the whole thing could be a downloadable package, with the user only having to periodically download a new controls.xml.

You are forgetting that a controls viewer (that shows the users controls) would also have to read a user's individual mame cfg files though. Imo that would be more difficult than any bandwidth issues.

I've been using IE9 for about a month or two now and while it supports html5 pretty well,.....when you start mixing other languages in with it... let's just say it's less than stable.

I do think we need to start thinking about a "official" controls.dat viewer though. Something web-based would be nice because it would instantly work on mac's and linux. Getting the database converted to the new format we were talking about probably should take priority though.

Alright, time to get back into the project - summer is over and it is getting cold out. I'm going to start by working on a better database design to store the information. Man, was I a rookie when I started this project.

I would like to help you.I have made a bunch of entries for my personal use (and I'm only getting warmed-up) and would like to share them.

I think I get the spirit of what this project is about, which is mainly about accuracy. Therefore, I will take some time to document my entries and leave off the dubious ones for my personal use only.

Some questions that would help me get started:- If I have entries with unverified label wording (but that I know exactly what they do in-game, should I leave them out or do you have a use for them?

- Do you accept individual entries for games that were part of multi-game systems like the Neo Geo or do you want those to remain at the system level (generic A, B, C & D buttons, in this case) as they are now

- I have gone one step further for the games that I've researched and tried to document the layout of the buttons, not just their labels, so that I can play them as faithful to the original as possible; is there a way to incorporate this type of information in the project (perhaps I can use the misc details area)?

- Do you have a standard set of required documentation you maintain for each entry?

I would like to help you.I have made a bunch of entries for my personal use (and I'm only getting warmed-up) and would like to share them.

I think I get the spirit of what this project is about, which is mainly about accuracy. Therefore, I will take some time to document my entries and leave off the dubious ones for my personal use only.

Some questions that would help me get started:- If I have entries with unverified label wording (but that I know exactly what they do in-game, should I leave them out or do you have a use for them?

- Do you accept individual entries for games that were part of multi-game systems like the Neo Geo or do you want those to remain at the system level (generic A, B, C & D buttons, in this case) as they are now

- I have gone one step further for the games that I've researched and tried to document the layout of the buttons, not just their labels, so that I can play them as faithful to the original as possible; is there a way to incorporate this type of information in the project (perhaps I can use the misc details area)?

- Do you have a standard set of required documentation you maintain for each entry?

Best regards and thanks for creating this fantastic project.

I think this is covered elsewhere, but when we mean "official label" it has absolutely nothing to do with the button/controls function. We want the label as it appears on the control panel overlay. Of course for controls that don't have a label, we try to get as official as we can via manuals and ect.. The reason neo-geo games only have "A, B, C, D" labels is two-fold:

1. All neo-geo overlays use these labels.... they are the official labels. 2. Every single solitary neo-geo game starts with a "how to play" screen that describes, in detail, what button does what.

That should pretty much answer all of your questions just with that example.

Because documentation is sparse there is no standardized set but here is a list of acceptable sources, from best to worst.

1. A picture of the games actual cpo. 2. An official source of documentation from the game, stating the controls (instruction card, game manual, ect)3. A "how to play" screen found within the game.4. Some other official source directly from the game's manufacturers.

5. Common sense (This one is rarely accepted unless the controls are really simple or we have precident with another game in the series)

Some examples of #5:

It's a 4-way joystick game with no buttons. We can safely assume that the labels are either non-existant (common for joysticks) or are up/down/left/right.

SF III Third Strike.... We can't find an official cpo image, but we already have a entry for the original sf III so we can assume they are the same.

Judge Dread.... It's a prototype so no official cpo or labels exist. We can look at photos of the prototype if possible, but if not, their function will have to do.

I still have several additions/corrections that you may find valuable and that adhere to the general philosophy of this project.

One example off the top of my head, is aburner2. In the MAME configuration screen, the fire button is labeled "fire" and the missile button is labeled "vulcan". This is inaccurate because vulcan actually refers to the vulcan cannon, which is the 20mm gun in the F-14 fighter, whereas missiles are just that (there is no such thing as vulcan missiles).